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Don Lemon Tonight
Romney Backing No One Yet for 2020; Women Power in 2019; Democrats Hours Away From Taking Control of House; Fact-Checking Trump's Border Wall Claims; Investigators Looking Into Undocumented Immigrants at Trump Golf Club. Aired 11-12a ET
Aired January 02, 2019 - 23:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[23:00:00] DON LEMON, CNN HOST: This is CNN TONIGHT. I'm Don Lemon. Thanks for joining us.
It's not every day that a former Republican presidential nominee who is now an incoming Republican senator takes on a sitting Republican president. But these are extraordinary times.
Senator-elect Mitt Romney wrote an op-ed for "The Washington Post" saying, quote, "The president has not risen to the mantle of the office."
Romney and the president have a complicated relationship to say the least. Back in 2012, Romney was tried to fend off Gingrich and Rick Santorum and he got a little help from an endorsement by reality TV star Donald Trump. He took it despite the fact that Trump was spreading the racist birther conspiracy theory about President Obama.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Mitt is tough. He's smart. He's sharp. He's not going to allow bad things to continue to happen to this country that we all love. So, Governor Romney, go out and get them. You can do it.
(APPLAUSE)
SEN.-ELECT MITT ROMNEY (R), MASSACHUSETTS: Thank you, thank you.
There are some things that you just can't imagine happening in your life. This is one of them. Being in Donald Trump's magnificent hotel and having his endorsement is a delight.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: That was then. Four years later with Trump winning primary after primary, Mitt Romney delivered a stunning rebuke of the front- runner.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ROMNEY: Now, I'm far from the first to conclude that Donald Trump lacks the temperament to be president.
There's plenty of evidence that Mr. Trump is a con man, a fake. Donald Trump is a phony, a fraud. His promises are as worthless as a degree from Trump university.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: He rumpled Republicans to vote strategically to deny Trump the delegates he needed to secure the nomination. Didn't work though. Trump got the nomination, went on to win the presidency.
Things then got better in the Trump/Romney relationship. The two broke bread as Romney ended up on the short list to become secretary of state. Look at that picture. My gosh. That picture says so much, more than I could even just -- can we put that picture back up? Look at that picture. Wow. Caption that. But Romney came up short, right?
And Trump went on to choose Rex Tillerson for that post, 2017 with rumors that Utah Senator Orrin Hatch would retire, Romney prepared for a Senate run and the president urged Hatch to stay on for another term with some in Romney's circle believing the whole thing was an attempt to block Romney from the Senate.
Well, Hatch ended up retiring. And it looked like the Trump-Romney feud was over with Trump endorsing Romney's Senate bid and Romney accepting his support.
But now just hours before he is sworn in as senator, Mitt Romney is speaking out about the president.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ROMNEY: I would work with the president as I would frankly with any president which is on those areas where I'm in agreement we'll be able to work together. Where I disagree, I'll point that out. But in matters that relate to the divisiveness that's been part of our political environment, I'll speak out if I need to, if there's something significant and I think it's important as I begin this new job to make it very clear where I stand.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: Mark McKinnon is here to discuss. Hey, Mark McKinnon, how you doing, sir?
MARK MCKINNON, EXECUTIVE PRODUCER, THE CIRCUS: Happy New Year.
LEMON: Happy--
(CROSSTALK)
MCKINNON: It looks like you were kicking it hard New Year's Eve in New Orleans.
LEMON: I had a great time. Now I'm back to business. So what's your reaction to had? Are you surprised to see Romney take a public stand criticizing the president?
MCKINNON: Well, I'm fascinated by Romney because like a lot of people I think over time, I keep wondering which Mitt Romney is going to show up.
LEMON: Right.
MCKINNON: And part of the answer to that I think is there are two Mitt Romneys. There's the Mitt Romney who is one acts one way when he's running and there's another Mitt Romney that acts one way when he's serving or he's not running for office.
[23:05:05] And at the core of Mitt Romney though, I think is somebody who is very McCain-like in the sense that he has a sense of honor and the dignity of the office and the character counts, country first. And so, I think people were really wondering to see which Mitt Romney was going to show up as the senator. And I think it's the public servant Mitt Romney.
And you know, he made it very clear right out of the gate he's not coming here to genuflect, that he's going to be a voice. And he said, listen, I agree with Donald, the president on a lot of policies. But the important point that I think that he makes that we haven't heard enough off from Republicans is that a lot of Republicans are just saying all that matters is the end. We don't care about the means. Mitt Romney is saying the means matters.
LEMON: I just want to play, this is Mitt Romney. This is with Jake Tapper earlier. Watch this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: When you say that you have issues with his character and you talk about his integrity and honesty, the suggestion being that he lacks integrity and honesty, what specifically has he done that has bothered you? What is the rhetoric that has come from his mouth his actions that trouble you the most?
ROMNEY: Well, over the course of the last two years, I have put out a number of statements that relate to things that were of great concern to me. The Charlottesville response by the president was something that gave me great concern, the support for Roy Moore in the Senate race was something I was very, very concerned about, his attack on media. I wrote an entire piece about that.
So, I've laid out time and again places where I disagree with the president and I think it's very important for a president to demonstrate the qualities of integrity and honesty forthrightness, empathy and respect for the institutions of our Democratic republic.
I think those are all parts of the job, and while I agree with him on a lot of policy fronts and salute the work that's been done by the Republican leadership in Washington, there are places that relate to the, if you will, forming of national character that I think we can do a better job.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: OK, a lot town pack there. He will still take the guy's endorsement, right? But he seems to be suggesting, Mark, that the president doesn't stand up for our values. What gives here?
MCKINNON: Well, like I said, there are two Mitt Romneys. There's the guy who is very ambitious, politically ambitious. When he is running campaign, he was sort of do anything to get where he wants to go, but once he's there, he sort of, you know, returns to form of that humble Mormon who thought a lot about service and public service and humility.
You know, one of -- we have a show called "The Circus" on Showtime that's a documentary designed to kind of show the different dimensions of the candidates and the inspiration for that show in part was the documentary Mitt where it was after the campaign unfortunately, it was a decision that they regret now because it showed a side of Mitt Romney that none of us had seen before.
When I saw that, I said I like that guy. I never saw that guy in the campaign. So, there's a side of Mitt Romney that I think the public hasn't seen a lot of. Maybe we'll see more of now that he's actually in the Senate.
LEMON: But what's interesting--
(CROSSTALK)
MCKINNON: And it's getting a good counter balancing voice. I mean, that so many Republicans haven't been speaking out and Mitt Romney said from day one I'm going to speak out on these matters that are important to me of moral conscious and integrity and honesty.
LEMON: I think -- I think -- look, listen, I think most people want that. The critics of Mitt Romney, the supporters of this president they don't want it. But I think most of the country want a check and they want Republicans to speak out and not just go lock step with whatever the president says even if it's not true or a lie. Having said that, this is the president's reaction to the op-ed today. Watch this, Mark.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: I wish Mitt could be more of a team player, you know, I'm surprised he did it this quickly. I was expecting something. But I'm surprised he did it this quickly. If he fought really hard against President Obama like he does against me, he would have won the election.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: So, he's saying Romney could be more of a team player. First, were you surprised at how measured he was, you know, and second, is the president effectively saying hey, Mitt, fall in line?
MCKINNON: Well, I think strategically, it was the right tone as opposed to just outright attacking him like he often does, you know, more sort of in anger and sorrow than -- more in sorrow than anger. But you know, then to say that he didn't work hard against Obama, I mean, that's pretty hard to get a guy come to be a team player.
So, listen, I mean, I think it's going to be kind of a fractured relationship over the next couple of years. There's going to be times when Donald Trump needs Mitt Romney and there's going to be times when Romney will support him. But I think Romney has just made clear that he's going to be his own voice and that he'll be a team player when he agrees on the policy but when he thinks that things are going sideways on important issues of honesty, integrity and the character of the office he's going to speak up. And I think it's good for the country that he is.
[23:09:59] LEMON: Listen, I keep putting this picture up. Because it's surprising considering how much he had criticized him. But this is them having dinner when he wanted to be secretary of state. I mean, listen, you and I talked about all of this at the time. And it was a pretty fascinating picture to look like. Some say it looks like his soul was taken away in that picture.
But I mean, he said -- there's the video of it. He says he's not running for president but he's undecided on whether he will endorse. Given his critique of the president, and his history with this president, can you imagine him endorsing Trump in the end?
MCKINNON: Hard to imagine and you know, I was -- I was quite critical. I wrote an article when Romney accepted the Trump endorsement back in '12. And I was surprised by that. But I think again, I think Romney, I think he has great character at the core of his conviction but I think he's also incredibly politically ambitious.
I think he's in part positioning himself for whatever circumstances may happen, and if things go south really quickly, which they could given all the investigations that are coming, he's in a very significant position to see where the future of the Republican Party could go.
LEMON: Yes. I think the criticism of Mitt Romney is people want to see the Mitt Romney from today be the Mitt Romney that is--
(CROSSTALK)
MCKINNON: Yes.
LEMON: -- always out front and center rather than the one that sitting at John George.
MCKINNON: I think it's a fair criticism.
LEMON: Yes.
MCKINNON: I think it's a fair criticism but I'm glad to see it when he--
(CROSSTALK) LEMON: Or accepting the endorsements of someone who was spreading a
birther lie, as well. Thank you. Happy New Year. Always a pleasure.
MCKINNON: Yes.
LEMON: Good to see you.
MCKINNON: Yes.
LEMON: The incoming 116th Congress will be the most diverse in American history. One hundred twenty-six women will take office, including 43 women of color. One member of this historic incoming freshman class joins me now. And it's Congresswoman-Elect Madeleine Dean of Pennsylvania. So glad to have you on. Happy New Year to you. Thanks for joining.
REP.-ELECT MADELEINE DEAN, (D) PENNSYLVANIA: Happy New Year. Thank you for having me, Don.
LEMON: So, your first day on the job is set to be in the middle of a government shutdown. What is your top priority?
Well, my top priority is to get started and get to work. I'm very thrilled and excited. You can imagine my family is coming into town. My friends and supporters. We have a couple of buses coming from Pennsylvania.
LEMON: Wow.
DEAN: So, I'm eager to number one, go through the important ceremonial swearing in, the important moment of being sworn in but really eager to get to work. None of us thought that we would be sworn in during a shutdown but that certainly emphasizes the urgency that this 116th Congress must meet at this moment.
LEMON: Is it fair to say that this is the year of the women on Capitol Hill?
DEAN: You bet it is. Take a look at the freshmen class of the, I think 67 folks in the freshman Democratic caucus newly elected, more than half are women. There are another two women in the Republican incoming caucus.
LEMON: Yes.
DEAN: So, it's very exciting.
LEMON: Yes. And I'm going to talk to you a little bit more about that. But what is behind this big change do you think?
DEAN: Well, I think maybe you've seen it and been covering it. Over the course of the last year, certainly very energized folks have come out from all across this country to support candidates, to run for office, people hole have never run for office before in their life.
There's a real energy in the air. I think a lot of it was driven by the election of our current president that people thought my vote really matters and I better be engaged and bring people to office that want to do the right work.
LEMON: Let's talk more, dig in deeper about what you said earlier and I said I'd follow up on it. While overall there will be more women than ever in this Congress, only one congresswoman elect, one of the 36 freshman female representatives are Republicans. Why is the GOP behind on increasing diversity?
DEAN: I don't know for sure. But I can tell you what I felt on the campaign trail. And that was that Democratic voters spoke to issues that women care deeply about and that the Republican administration certainly did nothing to uplift women and their families.
You just felt such an energy as I went around talking to voters, talking to young women in particular, and I think they identified very clearly with what Democratic women candidates were saying, that we need to make sure that we have health care, that we need do something about gun violence, that we need to do something about the opioid epidemic. That we need to make sure that the economy is growing for all of our kids and our families and we need to educate all our kids. Those values I think lifted an awful lot of Democratic women into office.
LEMON: A Democratic woman will be in charge of this Congress.
DEAN: yes.
LEMON: Nancy Pelosi is once again going to be the speaker of the house. And tomorrow she could single-handedly change Trump's presidency. What do you expect that it's going to be like working with her?
DEAN: I look forward to it. I have to tell you I did not know Nancy Pelosi before I ran for office. And she generously came to my district and worked for me and tried to lift up the message that I had for voters.
[23:15:00] She came multiple times. I had the chance to visit with her in other places. And I'm just one of the many people who were running for office that she helped out. She is a team builder. She is tireless. You'll see her at meeting after meeting after meeting in her high heels. I don't know how she does it. But she does it with a purpose and her purpose is good government and lifting people up and doing good things for other people.
LEMON: Yes. You previously said that you want to work on government reform, restoring decency to public service.
DEAN: Yes.
LEMON: What does that look like?
DEAN: Well, you know what, Don, as I was out on the trail, it is the one theme that came over and over again. I've told the story of one rainy day being caught in the rain and I talked to a voter, told them what I was interested in and I said to the gentleman, what do you care about? And he was silent and he said, decency. That was literally all he said, one word.
But that same sentiment was echoed over and over. And what that means to me is decency in how we speak, decency how we conduct ourselves. I think that's a direct reaction to the Trump administration in terms of conduct and rhetoric and voice. And how we treat one another. Do we try to lift people up or do we try to divide them? Do we treat people humanely or do we separate children at the border putting their lives at risk?
That's what decency is about, the things that American people care about, taking care of our border security while honoring our strength of immigration.
LEMON: Congresswoman-elect, you mentioned immigration. Where do you stand going in? You know the government's shut down because of the border wall and immigration and border safety. Where do you stand on that? How are you going to get started on the first day?
DEAN: We aren't shut down on that issue. This is a government that has cared about in a bipartisan way border security. The president chose to shut us down. Over that issue over his wall. His vision of a wall. A wall that his vision is constantly shifting but now it is a $5 billion solid wall. Democrats and Republicans care about border security and we currently fund border security.
LEMON: Congresswoman-elect, thank you and good luck.
DEAN: Thank you. Happy New Year.
LEMON: Is all the diversity in the incoming Congress a direct result of President Trump? We're going to discuss next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEMON: We are now just hours away from Democrats taking control of the House, changing everything in Washington.
[23:19:59] Let's talk about it now. Sally Kohn is here. She is the author of the "Opposite of Hate, A Feel Guide to Repairing Our Humanity." Did I scare you when I said your name?
SALLY KOHN, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I'm just excited to being here. It's late but we're here.
LEMON: Also, Keith Boykin and Alice Stewart here, and Rick Wilson, the author of "Everything Trump Touches Dies." They're excited to be here, too. They're here late every night almost by the way.
KOHN: I know I'm not. So, it's OK.
ALICE STEWART, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Welcome to the party, Sally.
KOHN: Thank you. Don't worry I had caffeine. LEMON: Happy new year everyone. Keith, I'm going to start with you.
The midterms--
(CROSSTALK)
KEITH BOYKIN, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: Happy New Year, Don.
LEMON: Absolutely. You brought in the most freshman class in history, the largest class of women ever. Should President Trump's policies and rhetoric get some of the credit for these historic, these historic changes?
BOYKIN: No, not at all. I mean, yes, I'll give him a little bit of credit actually, you know. But the reality is that Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, other candidates along the way have encouraged people of color, women, diverse candidates to run for office. And then people in the grassroots have been interested in running for office.
The white men are 29.9 percent of the population. And I think if you look at the statistics, 98 percent of the speakers of the House of Representatives there are probably something like 90 percent of the Supreme Court justices. And people are looking at our country and they're saying this is something that Democrats have been saying for a long time.
We want an America, we want our Congress that looks like America, we want a government that looks like America who wanted to be representative. Women are the majority of the population. It's time that we have more women in leadership roles. It's time to have another woman who is speaker of the house in Nancy Pelosi for a second term.
LEMON: OK. Let me ask you - so, maybe that I was speaking more about maybe the rhetoric and maybe it was a bit of sarcasm here, Sally, because of the president's policies.
KOHN: Sarcastic, you?
LEMON: Because of his rhetoric that more women and more diverse candidates said you know what, I'm sick of this. I'm going to go run and therefore, now we have a historic Congress with all these women, no?
KOHN: I mean, sure if we're desperate to give Trump credit for something, that's fine.
(CROSSTALK)
LEMON: That sort of give him credit (Inaudible).
KOHN: I mean, look, I do think Keith is exactly right. The time has come, this has been a long time coming historically. And by the way, this is a drop in the bucket. We are nowhere near parity.
So, as much as we should celebrate the moment that's happening now, we're absolutely nowhere near parity and we are not to the point where we have a Congress, more importantly that not only looks like the American public but is actually taking on and addressing the concerns that the American public says over and over and over again they want them to do.
Address climate change, raise wages, raise taxes on the rich, make the country work for working people, address gender and equality and racial injustice, actually fix things. We may be now are getting closer and closer to a Congress that will actually work for all of Americans.
LEMON: OK. So, Alice, the Democrats celebrated numerous historic firsts on election. I just want to put that. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez became America's youngest congresswoman, the first two Muslim Congress women, as well as two Native American congresswoman, the first openly gay man elected to governor in Colorado.
So, I just want to -- and let me put Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez posted the picture on her social media today, there it is, that she and her fellow incoming female representatives -- I just wonder, is this female takeover of Congress tomorrow, Nancy Pelosi and the rest of the women?
STEWART: It's a very important first step. And I think that's a good thing because this will help in my view help the dialogue move along. We've got a long way to go though. Right now, women in Congress here represent about 23 percent makeup of Congress, yet we have 51 percent of the population.
And I'll say hats off to the Democrats did a really good job of recruiting women candidates. They have in the House Democrats have 35 new freshmen members and Republicans one. Over in the Senate, it's 11 to 3 in the Democrats favor. So, I think that is a very strong positive step. This will help for a lot of reasons. I think it will help the dialogue and getting things done. But it's a good sign for voters.
I think it will get more women involved in politics, more women next time in the midterm elections certainly, but it will get more people involved in the conversation. That's always a good thing.
LEMON: Yes. Rick, you got to give Alice credit for her positive spin, right? Because there is a stark difference between the diversity of incoming Democrats and Republicans. A GOP House caucus jumped from 86 percent white and male to 90 percent while the Democrats dropped from 41 percent to 38 percent white and male. Why can't the GOP attract more diverse candidates?
RICK WILSON, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: Well, look, Don, the only criteria right now in American politics for the Republican Party for selection in a primary is, who is willing to polish to be the biggest boot liquor for Donald Trump. That is the selection mechanism that exists in the GOP primary process right now. And you know, white dudes over 55 love Donald Trump.
[23:24:56] So, you know, there's sort of the demo you are going to get when you narrowed the gate to get into the door to the party, you know, to who loves Donald Trump more. You know, who's got a Donald Trump tramp stamp you know, those are the people that are being put forward now.
So, you're going to end with you know the male and pale contingent got even maler and paler.
LEMON: Why the faces, Sally?
KOHN: I have images that I can't unsee, but also, I think that's fast. And at the same time, let's not give Donald Trump too much credit which is the Republican Party has had a long-standing problem not only having candidates.
BOYKIN: Exactly.
KOHN: Who are women and people of color.
(CROSSTALK)
WILSON: Look, listen--
KOHN: But also attracting voters. And that's not because just of the leadership. That's because of the policies they support. When you support anti-immigrant, anti-gay, anti-women policies you turn off women and people of color and gay folks at the ballot box and as candidates.
LEMON: Let us Rick respond. You want to respond, Rick?
WILSON: Look, I think that there's a, there's been a policy shift in the Republican Party in that they've moved from, look, the Republican Party used to be strongly pro-immigration.
LEMON: Right.
WILSON: This is a fairly recent artifact of Trump and Trumpism.
LEMON: It really is.
WILSON: That we've decided we're going to basically tell Hispanics that we think they're all murderers and shouldn't be here.
LEMON: Yes.
WILSON: And that the caravan is full of assassins charging our border. I mean, that's a fairly recent development but Trumpism has exaggerated and exacerbated it dramatically. And Republicans lack the moral courage to stand up and say this guy is wrong.
LEMON: Keith.
WILSON: This is insane.
BOYKIN: Yes.
LEMON: Keith, let me put this picture up for you before you respond.
(CROSSTALK) WILSON: This is in our principles.
BOYKIN: OK.
LEMON: Because this is published in the latest in Vanity Fair. Remember what you were going to say. But this is in Vanity Fair it's called the watchdogs. These are the new House of Representatives committee chairs, Elijah Cummings, Jerry Nadler, Adam Shift--
BOYKIN: Maxine Waters.
LEMON: -- Maxine Waters, Richard Neal. They will now have the ability to investigate the president. Will tomorrow bring a whole new presidency for Trump do you think?
BOYKIN: I think it will. Actually, that's the reason why I'm here in Washington right now for a reception for Maxine Waters tomorrow. She is going to be the chair of the financial services committee. We're going to see some change. We're going to see investigations, we're going to see accountability. We're going to see leadership. We're going to see new legislation put forward.
And Donald Trump is going to have to for the first time in his adult life and practically, probably his entire life have to have somebody who says no to him because he hasn't had that in the two years he's been president, he probably never had that in his business life and it's time in America that he understands he is not a king.
LEMON: I just kept saying--
(CROSSTALK)
STEWART: I think -- I think--
LEMON: Alice, Alice, would you mind holding the thought? I promise you I'm going to get you on the other side of the break. I've got to take a break. But I got -- before I go to a break, I got to tell you as I was thinking, it took me back to my first day of first grade. Kindergarten, nursery school were so easy that first day in first grade--
BOYKIN: Right.
LEMON: -- where you had, you know--
(CROSSTALK)
KOHN: All you had to do was color in the lines.
LEMON: I was just going to say he's had, it's been like nursery school and kindergarten because he's had Republican control of everything. Now--
(CROSSTALK)
KOHN: It's the most depressing metaphor I've ever heard. LEMON: -- some people are there who are going to eat his lunch and
take his lunch money and he's got to get used to it.
STEWART: And no more naptime.
LEMON: And no more -- no more naptime. Less -- Alice, that's a good one. What do we call it? No more executive time. We'll be right back. Alice gets the first word.
[23:30:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEMON: Back with me now, Sally Kohn, Keith Boykin, Alice Stewart, and Rick Wilson.
OK, Alice, so, listen, you know, my whole eating is luncheon analogy (ph), but Democrats are going to take control of the House tomorrow. What do you think this is going to mean for the president and his agenda? This is going to be tough going for him, no?
STEWART: It will. I mean, there's a new sheriff in town tomorrow and that is called Democratic Oversight. It's a new reality and it's going to be certainly more challenging to get things done.
LEMON: How do you think he's going to react?
STEWART: It will be difficult. He'll react just like he did when we started this shutdown fight. Unfortunately, he's going to sit there there with his arms crossed and hopefully try to get his way. But as we've seen nearly two weeks into the shutdown, it's not happening. Look, I think, Democratic Oversight will be a good thing. It's important, something the president needs to not call presidential harassment. It is important.
But if they will go in there thinking they're going to focus so much on investigation, not litigation, that's going to be a very short- lived honeymoon for Democrats. It's important they get in there, do the proper oversight that needs to get done, but also work on bridging the gap and getting bipartisanship gain and get some legislation passed.
LEMON: Rick, Nancy Pelosi in an interview today said, nope, not budging at all. I don't see any signs at all from the Senate budging, as well. So, where do we go from here?
WILSON: Donald trump - if the Democrats give in to Donald Trump, it would have to come on the Senate side. Pelosi has absolutely locked it down. She has the votes. Her people are not going to budge on it. There will be no wall coming out of the House.
If it comes out of the House, it will be because Schumer gets strong armed on it, and he's a transactional guy. So Democrats really need to focus on how Schumer's behavior is going to be modified by this. But right now, Schumer is standing strong and no matter how many times Donald Trump tweets, no matter how much he spends his morning executive time hoovering up rails of Adderall and rage tweeting, it's not going to change where Pelosi is. So, as long as she holds the line, this thing is going to go on until Trump feels the pain level rise. Shutdowns never work out politically for anybody. And as much as Republicans think that the rules have changed, there are 800,000 people not getting a paycheck right now.
They are not just in D.C. They are across the country. There are 800,000 federal jobs, and as much as he may want to shrink the federal government, these are air traffic controllers and these are folks that perform vital government services every day, and that pain level is increasing by the day.
And the political cost is dawning (ph) under Donald Trump and the Republicans. Right now, about two-thirds of people think it's Trump and the Republicans, not the Democrats that are causing the shutdown slow down. Trump stupidly walked into this one, put his head on the chopping block and said, I'll take credit for the shutdown. OK.
LEMON: Yeah.
WILSON: There's a 30-second ad for you.
LEMON: Yeah, he did box himself in. But Sally, you seemed to take umbrage when Rick said that, you know, I'm talking about Schumer.
SALLY KOHN, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, look, no, no, no, I think first of all, I wouldn't portray Nancy Pelosi that way. On the one hand, she is right to oppose the wall not only because it's immoral, not only because the majority of the American voters are against it, but because even think tanks in Trump's own party say it's stupid and wasteful and pointless.
[23:35:00] LEMON: We have a fact check coming up right after the second, by the way. Stick around for that.
KOHN: Right, but --
WILSON: That was my point.
KOHN: But the other thing is actually she has put -- she has put a proposal on the table that would give Trump and the Republicans some of what they wanted, would reopen parts of the government --
LEMON: We know that. It's not going to happen in the House. What about the --
KOHN: She's trying to make it work. His own party is putting proposals on the table. His own vice president is putting proposal on the table.
LEMON: The point was that this rests with Chuck Schumer now and if Chuck --
KOHN: No, it rests with Donald Trump. It is 100 percent --
LEMON: No, no, no. That's not what I'm saying. KOHN: He has decided to throw -- no, no, I don't think Trump - I don't think Schumer will cave either. I don't think Schumer is going to cave either. I don't think because there's nothing to cave to. What would a cave look like? It would look like picking up one of the Republican proposals or picking up Pence's proposal which Trump has already rejected.
LEMON: Go, Keith.
KEITH BOYKIN, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Donald Trump had two years to get this done. He has not done it. He had a Republican Congress, unified control of the entire government for two years. It's not the Democrats' responsibility to bail him out for his lie. He said that Mexico was going to pay for the wall. Mexico did not pay for the wall. He said the Republican Congress would get it done. Republican Congress did not get it done.
Suddenly, tomorrow, we fact, in just a few minutes, we're going to have Republican-controlled Congress come to an end, and Democrats will take control. It's not the Democrats' responsibility to bail out the Republicans for Donald Trump's lie. He made it. He's got to sleep in his bed.
LEMON: How did we get from Mexico is going to pay for the wall to --
BOYKIN: The American taxpayer.
LEMON: The Americans -- yeah, but there were a couple more iterations. Now we're to the American taxpayers paying for the wall. Go ahead, Alice. I'll give you the last word. I'm out of time now.
STEWART: Well, of course, now he says Mexico is actually paying for it, but, you know, give him a hamburger today and they'll pay for it tomorrow. The reality is, look, both sides, this is a battle of the base.
If Trump would just come down off his $5 billion and Democrats would agree to talk about -- everyone agree to talk about DACA, the Democrats give some, the Republicans give some, we could actually have what everyone wants which is border security.
That is a huge issue that all Americans can agree on. Both sides just have to give a little bit in order to get what the American people want.
LEMON: OK. Well --
WILSON: President Miller will never allow DACA.
STEWART: That's true.
(LAUGHTER)
LEMON: Thank you. Oh, that hurt. Or President Coulter or President Limbaugh. Thank you guys. Appreciate it.
STEWART: Thanks, Don.
LEMON: President making more false claims about his border wall as he keeps the government shut down over funding for it. So, we're going to check his facts. That's next.
[23:40:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEMON: Let's talk about the wall. We've all heard this president, the lies that this president continues to tell about the promised border wall, lies like these.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: Mexico is going to pay for the wall.
Tremendous amounts of wall have already been built.
It's going to be as beautiful as a wall can be.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: All lies. Trump is asking Congress for money for the border wall, not Mexico. No parts of the wall have been built. Old barriers have been refurbished. And it can't be beautiful. It doesn't exist. You might have missed it, but over the holidays, President Trump recycled one of his oldest and most misleading claims about the wall he wants between the U.S. and Mexico.
Here's part of his tweet. OK? "Everybody knows that the wall will work perfectly. In Israel, the wall works 99.9 percent." This one goes all the way back to the beginning of the 2016 election.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: Walls work. All you have to do is ask Israel. Walls work if it's properly constructed. Not the walls that these characters, these politicians that we have running our country who are a disgrace, all talk, no action politicians. They build a wall this big. They drive cars right through it. Walls work. All you have to do is go and see Israel. They will tell you that walls work.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LEMON: OK, but the truth and circumstance, very different. There are a lot of barriers in Israel. Notably, there are fences along the southern boarder with Egypt and walls and other types of barriers separating Israel from the West Bank and Gaza. Trump doesn't say which wall in Israel works almost 100 percent of the time to keep people out.
So, what could he be talking about? If Trump is talking about the fence, a structure that is fortified with electricity and barbed wire, but it's still not a wall on Israel's southern border, he might have a point there. This is what PolitiFact says. The fact checking organization called PolitiFact says the fence on that border did cut illegal crossings at Israel's southern border with Africa, but the decline in illegal entries came with the help of other deterrent policies. And it's very different from our border with Mexico and totally unlike what Trump has proposed building there.
The geography, for one, is different. Parts of the southern New Mexico and Texas can get mountainous unlike southern Israel which is relatively flat. That means it's a lot less land and an easier task for Israeli border guards to patrol there.
The scale of the project is also different. The U.S.-Mexico border is some 13 times longer than Israel's border with Egypt. And oh, yeah, it's a fence, not a concrete wall or steel slats. And the Israeli fence looks nothing like the prototypes commissioned by the Trump administration, the ones that cost millions of dollars before construction has even started.
Can Trump claim that his wall will do the same as Israel's southern border fence? Probably not. Let me explain. If President Trump is talking about the barriers between Israel, Israeli and Palestinian territories, that is nothing to aspire to. A fact check from The Washington Post notes that there is a "vast smuggling industry that manages to thrive in spite of both concrete wall and electronic fence."
And the New York Times reports that networks of tunnels, ladders and holes enable tens of thousands of people to have unauthorized access to Israel at any given time. That doesn't sound like working 99.9 percent of the time to me.
[23:44:59] So as usual, the president, well, has continued to recycle old lies and misleading claims about his promised border wall. But there are new lies, too. Because over the weekend, Trump also claimed on Twitter with no evidence that former President Barack Obama has a ten-foot wall surrounding his D.C. residence. He said, we need the same thing but bigger around the country.
Well, "The Washington Post" says the Obamas have a fence around their home like others in their neighborhood and there is no ten-foot wall to be found. So, what's the truth about Trump's wall? John Kelly, former White House chief of staff, might have let it slip. Over the weekend. He told The L.A. Times this, "to be honest, it's not a wall."
Not a wall. But today, someone in the White House is still calling it a wall. The president claimed on twitter that much of the wall has been built. He didn't say much of the barrier has been built or that steel slats have been built. What he said is not true. None of his wall has been built.
Democrats are taking control of the House tomorrow. And they say the president's chances of getting any wall at all are slim to none. So now the president is holding federal workers' paychecks hostage in his fight for the wall he probably won't get. This is the reality. Day 13 of the government shutdown begins in just a few minutes, and the president is not paying federal workers because he wants you and me to pay for the wall.
If Mexico is really going to pay for it and they say they won't, the government would be up and running right now. So to distract and deflect from this reality, the president has been tweeting lies, old lids and new lies, but tweeting isn't believing, seeing is. And we all see zero miles of his border wall right now. This president might have some immigration issues in his own company.
My next guest represents undocumented immigrants who work at his Bedminster golf club and claimed supervisors at the club gave them fake immigration documents.
[23:50:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LEMON: There are new signs that federal and state investigators may be looking into the Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, New Jersey. Attorney for two undocumented immigrants who went public in New York Times' piece last month, working at the club in close proximity to the president, says that supervisors at Bedminster furnished his clients with fake employment documents, and he says he has provided the FBI and the New Jersey attorney general's office with proof.
Anibal Romero, the attorney for those women, he joins me now, and also CNN Legal Analyst Elie Honig is here as well. Good evening to both of you. So let's talk. Let's get the facts in here. You're alleging that supervisors at the golf club gave out fake green cards and social security numbers. I mean, it's shocking given that the president has been such an immigration hard line.
ANIBAL ROMERO, ATTORNEY FOR UNDOCUMENTED EMPLOYEES AT TRUMP NATIONAL GOLF CLUB: Correct. And I was shocked as well when one of my clients, Victorina Morales, said to me that the picture for her green card was taken inside of the golf club. The very next day, she was taken by one of the drivers to a town nearby to pick up the green card and social security number. She brought it back to the golf club, copies were made, and she was told never to talk about that incident ever again.
With regards to my other client, Sandra Diaz, she was only required to provide two pictures. And again, a social security number and a green card was handed to her and that's what we have at this point.
LEMON: OK. You went to the FBI and New Jersey attorney general's office, right, before your clients came forward?
ROMERO: We have been in contact with the FBI and with the attorney general's office.
LEMON: OK, why did you decide to go to authorities after the piece?
ROMERO: Sure. No, no, we actually went to authorities before.
LEMON: Before the piece.
ROMERO: Correct. Because both of my clients, specifically in the case of Victorina Morales, she was still employed at the golf club. She was complaining of physical assaults. She was complaining of threats of deportation. She was basically telling me that she was in a toxic environment. No one was listening to her.
So I thought that obviously I had to contact authorities. I was a little concerned. I wasn't sure who to contact at first. This is not what I do. I'm an immigration attorney. However, I reached out to federal authorities and they've listened.
LEMON: What kind of crimes are we talking about, Elie?
ELIE HONIG, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: So assuming that these allegations are true, we could be looking at various crimes. First of all, there are federal crimes for creating false immigration documents, the visas, the passports. There are federal crimes for knowingly employing somebody who's an unauthorized alien. And the most serious crime that could be implicated, again, assuming the facts are true, is a form of human trafficking known as forced labor.
That sounds dramatic but it's actually quite common. This scenario where an employer who's looking to cut costs, not pay benefits, take advantage of vulnerable populations, will find someone who is undocumented, put them to work. And then as you allege, use threats in order to keep those people in line.
You can't go to the cops, right? I will have you deported and in some instances physical abuse. It's actually quite prevalent. I've done trials involving forced labor. We've seen it everywhere from migrant workers in farms to factory workers, the sex industry, sex trafficking and the hospitality industry.
LEMON: So based on what Anibal, the information that he gave authorities, does it look like there's going to be a formal investigation?
HONIG: Yeah, it sounds like there already is one. It sounds like the New Jersey attorney general's office is working hand-in-hand with federal investigators and the FBI. And if these facts are proven out and do withstand investigation, then you could have federal and/or state crimes.
LEMON: So, it would be federal and -- so again who potentially would be leading this investigation?
HONIG: It sounds like the FBI has taken the lead. Most immigration crimes are going to be federal, so your immigration documents, crimes are going to be federal. Your employment of unauthorized aliens will be federal. Human trafficking. There are federal crimes on the forced labor/human trafficking in state. I would assume they would coordinate and get together, but it should be federal ultimately.
LEMON: One of your clients is still undocumented, right? Still being paid by the club?
[23:55:00] ROMERO: I actually represent five out of six women that have come forward, and yes, four of them are still undocumented.
LEMON: Are they concerned about potential repercussions?
ROMERO: They are concerned, but in the United States, when you are a victim of a crime, immigration laws protect you. There's a possibility of an S visa, there is a possibility of a T visa or U visa. So, we feel that they are protected.
LEMON: Yet another Trump entity being investigated, Elie. I mean, is it staggering, the number of investigations around this president?
HONIG: It seems like everything that the president has touched over the years is now being subject to investigation and with some teeth to it. And this one, I think, there's a particular line of hypocrisy here given the hard line that this president has taken on immigration, and yet it appears if these allegations are true, that his own golf club was employing illegals and abusing them as well.
LEMON: The White House hasn't commented on this. Have you heard anything from the White House?
ROMERO: We have not heard anything.
LEMON: Do you expect to?
ROMERO: I have no idea.
LEMON: You have no idea what's going to happen. It's unbelievable, again, as you said considering the hard line this president has taken on immigration, especially illegal immigration as he called it, and undocumented immigrants coming to the country.
If there's another investigation into this depending on how this proves out, it's just unbelievable. Thank you, both. Best of luck. Come back and give us an update.
ROMERO: Thank you.
LEMON: I appreciate it. Thanks for watching, everyone. Our coverage continues.
[24:00:00] (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
